Day two of MWC but day three out in the field for our NBA (Norfolk Boy Abroad), he’s feeling the strain of swollen feet and possible (unlikely) carpal tunnel syndrome from the amount of hand shaking he’s doing. Bear Grylls he ain’t.

We caught up with him last night to see how he was bearing up…

How did you cope with this morning’s temporary iPad glitch?

Umm with the help of Dagmara from AsiaInfo really. It doesn’t work how you would expect an iPad app to work because of what was needed for the entry of the scores. If a player comes from a previous day then when they enter their email address on day 2, 3 or 4 and it realises they are a previous player and brings up their details you have to go to settings. This brings up a popup saying the players record ID. You skip that. Then it brings up a popup saying the date / time they first entered the system. You skip that and then the third pop up is what allows you to change the day they are saved for. This moves their record from the previous day to the current day.
As the event goes on players are returning again and again to beat old scores in an attempt to win the competition. This is going to get a bit of a mess over the next couple of days, but Dagmara (bless her) has kindly taken on going through all that hassle for me. It was either that or I stay on the stand all day to take on the hassle myself, or we would have to spend a few hours every evening getting all 60 email addresses for the day back out and going through 1 by 1 deleting them by entering their full email address so it would ensure their would be no repeat players for the next day so they would save in the correct day.
We’re only half way through so we’ll see how it progresses.

What was the funniest/ most interesting reaction someone gave to the game today?

We had a lad today who was really jumpy (above left). He jumped way back when he hit a barrier in the game and was gripping the sides of that pod like he was going to rip it off heheh. People walking by did get very curious though. It definitely drew attention.
On the flip side this guy (above right) was the most laid back bloke ever, he was totally chilled and laying in the pod. I had to wonder if he was using it as an excuse for a bit of a kip heheh. He only scored 200 points so definitely wasn’t trying very hard!

Have you managed to reach any of the networking areas yet?

I am not allowed into a few of the high powered ones because of my badge being exhibitor only. But yes I have taken moments to go into the networking gardens when I can. It’s pleasant but there is loads of people trying to push their wares and not a lot of business to be done there or meetings to set up.

I have actually done far better either on the stand where people ask about us doing similar stuff for them, or I did speak to a few people on their own stands. But I think if I was to say what was my best 5 contacts it would be the ones I met while on AsiaInfo’s stand showing off our game.

Is there a quicker way of getting around MWC- are people using hoverboards?

There are a few people on scooters and skateboards weaving through but the density of people is so high they don’t get a clear run to get a speed up. The main halls all have conveyor belts between them and I remember on my first day thinking why do people stand still on them blocking the rest from walking along. But now I know when your feet hurt after day 1 you just want a conveyor to take you as far as it can while you stand and grab some respite!

On the train home it was obviously packed and at one point a seat became free and an old man was looking at it. Of course I let him have it but there was a bit of me thinking I dont care old man. MY feet ache and I need a seat heheh.

Summarise today in a sentence:

It was the busiest and every player of our game takes the headset off with a smile.

Over and out, Norfolk Boy Abroad.